The 1955 article paints a rosy world, straight out of Pleasantville.  Witness the headline:

In a sense, it really was a different era. As the 1955 Life article claims, “Embroiled in no war, impeded by no major strikes, blessed by almost full employment, the U.S. was delighted with itself and almost nobody was mad with nobody.” But Greene notes the dark underbelly of the era: “Racial inequity was widespread, constrictive conformity was all around, intolerance of anything different was itself tolerated … your list could go on and on.”

More importantly, Greene compares the fantasies of yesteryear with the “anger” of today:

If monolithic national happiness was, in fact, being sold as a commodity back then, a case can also be made that the commodity being sold to us today is national animosity. Just about every day, we are told how furious we are at each other. If . . . Life magazine was endeavoring to promote the notion of consensus, what we are being relentlessly barraged with now is a message of anti-consensus. And that may be just as false an impression, in its own way, as the everyone’s-joyful pitch was in 1955.

Cass Sunstein makes a similar, important point, one that others have made, and one that bears emphasis.  In an age of information overload, people are drawn like bees to viewpoints that reinforce pre-existing social and political beliefs. I’ve written about the problems of information overload in the trademark context. Here, in the context of social tensions, the echo chamber is even more dangerous. It’s easy to read the Drudge Report or Huffington Post and pat yourself on the back — left shoulder or right, as the case may be — for being so clever as to believe things that other smart (or sometimes smart) people are saying. It’s quite another to force yourself to question your beliefs by reading things that challenge them. Moreover, the loss of shared communal experiences (something that Sunstein correctly bemoans) means that you’re losing out on beliefs and values that you may not even know about.

And now for something completely different….  Not only were the pundits of the 1950s wrong about themselves. They also got the future wrong. Witness this 1959 cover of Superman, where the Big Blue Boy Scout battles evil-doers from the year 2000, who use ray guns from flying cars.

Me, my 2001 Tiburon doesn’t fly, let alone possess a ray gun. But thank goodness it can get NPR on Satellite radio (as well as Fox and CNN).

Thinvisibility: n.

1. Being neither completely visible nor completely invisible.
2. Being a tiny, shiny needle in a haystack of information overload.
3. Being invisible to everyone except data aggregators and digital preservationists such as Google, the Wayback Machine, the NSA, and others.
4. Being invisible to employers, colleges, police, neighbors, friends, exes, stalkers, acquaintances, and others, who are not interested in you, until they are.
5. Being visible.

IMHO, information overload is addictive, and it doesn’t necessarily lead to knowledge or wisdom. I don’t know about others, but the biggest thing that clears my mind is getting away from the computer, the Blackberry, and the television, and sitting quietly to read or think. As most people know, today that’s not always easy to do.

Too bad that some of the amateurs on the Web don’t have similar class.  Shortly after the bad call, somebody vandalized Joyce’s Wikipedia page to declare he was dead.  That’s just sick.  Yesterday, I saw that Joyce’s name was a trending Twitter topic, but the results were polluted with Twitter spam.

Such online foolishness illustrates what Andrew Keen derided as the “Cult of the Amateur” in his book by the same name.  Keen says:

We — those of us who want to know more about the world, those of us who are the consumers of mainstream culture — are being seduced by the empty promise of the “democratized” media.  For the real consequence of the Web 2.0 revolution is less culture, less reliable news, and a chaos of useless information.  One chilling reality in this brave new digital epoch is the blurring, obfuscation, and even disappearance of truth.

In some ways, the foolishness of Wiki vandals and Twitter spammers provides support for Keen’s observations.  But Keen’s critiques of amateurs are also somewhat overblown.  Keen’s preference for traditional “experts” over Web 2.0 “amateurs” ignores that the distinctions between the two are not always clear.  Indeed, in federal court, the qualification of a witness as an “expert” permitted to provide opinion testimony on “scientific, technical, or other specialized knowledge” is often sharply argued.  Plus, traditional experts are also subject to error, as amply illustrated by Joyce’s bad call.

But Joyce has class, something that doesn’t require, or always come with, expertise.  You either have it or you don’t.

Also, even without a perfect game, Galarraga’s game combined with Joyce’s bad call are the stuff of legend.  As Paul Clemens noted in the New York Times, the replays of the bad call may become “baseball’s Zapruder film.”  Such immediate-legend status is even better illustrated by this exchange between Kevin Costner (Roy) and Rene Russo (Molly) in the classic sports film Tin Cup.  Immediately prior, golfer Roy loses the U.S. Open by massively blowing par by stubbornly refusing to take a lay-up shot on the 18th hole for an easy win.  Instead, he tries (repeatedly) to hit the ball over a long water hazard.  Roy loses the tournament, but wins the hearts of the fans, and of Molly:

Molly: That was incredible! That was the shot of the tournament!

Roy: I just gave away the U.S. Open.

Molly: It doesn’t matter.

Roy: One time in my life I know the safe play to hit and I still…Shit, I still can’t make myself do it.

Molly: It doesn’t matter.

Roy: My whole career, my whole life on the line…I just made a 12 on the last hole of the Open!

Molly: You sure did. It was the greatest 12 of all time. No one’s going to remember the Open 10 years from now, who won…but they’ll remember your 12! My, God, Roy, it was…Well, it’s immortal! I am so proud of you!

Sometimes it’s the ones that get away that are the most memorable.

Until today.  Now Google permits users to select background images, either from an online database or their own computers.  Sure, other search providers have pretty backgrounds (Bing, anyone?)  Sure, it’s kind of pretty.  But after playing with backgrounds for a few minutes, I went back to the default white.

Why avoid backgrounds?  To reduce information overload and the attendant distractions.  Google is an essential tool, one that should foster focus rather than distraction.  The loading of the background and the perceived — even if not actual — delay, is another addition to a sea of distractions.  For better or for worse, I use Google numerous times a day.  In an era where focused attention is becoming increasingly difficult — see, e.g., Distracted: The Erosion of Attention and the Coming Dark Age by Maggie Jackson — the fewer distractions, the better.

Plus, Google is a hypocrite.  Contrasting Google’s new “backgrounds” feature with the company’s stance on privacy is extremely revealing.  A few years back, as noted here, Google adamantly refused to include a link to its privacy policy on its home page, allegedly because an additional link would distract from its “beautiful clean home page.”  Only after privacy advocates pushed did Google finally relent and add a privacy link to its homepage.  Even now, that link remains in the smallest typeface, possibly to avoid reminding people of how much information they sacrifice to Google daily.  Yet if Google truly cares so much for its minimalist aesthetic, why permit users to now clutter their homepages with pictures of kittehs?

So my response to Google: yuk.  For now, I’ll carry Google’s banner and stick to the minimum.  Enough distractions.

Considering the popularity of Supreme Court bobbleheads (as reported in yesterday’s New York Times), maybe the Court should next set up a Facebook page.   I’d be happy to friend some of the Justices, starting with Stevens, who has several Facebook pages devoted to him, including John Paul Stevens, John Paul Stevens’ Bowties, and John Paul Stevens: The Most Adorable Supreme Court Justice.

In celebration of Pi Day, here are ten uses of Pi having nothing to do with math:

10. As the title of a movie.

9. As a college cheer at MIT.

8. As the basis for a book of poetry and stories.

7. As allegedly inaccurate lyrics to a Kate Bush song.

6. As decorations on t-shirts, buttons, mugs, clocks, jewelry, and plushies.

5. As a Facebook group.

4. As a rap song and violin piece.

3. As the name of a dog and a cat.

2. As the name of a pizza place, of course!

1. And the winner — a Pi pie!

For more Pi fun, check out Pi Day, the source of some of the uses described above.

Addendum: Here’s another great Pi pie:

Below is a side-by-side comparison of the original and new video.

I’m glad to see that nothing (yet) has been done to try to take down the video.  The video also makes me wonder about what we mean when we use the term “mash-up.”  As far as mash-ups go, Galactica: Sabotage is dissimilar to Danger Mouse’s mash-up classic Grey Album, which juxtaposed music samples from the Beatles’ White Album with vocals from Jay-Z’s Black Album.  In such a mash-up, you simultaneously hear portions from both sources.  It’s music with music.

However in form (but perhaps not function), Galactica: Sabotage is different.  Same music, but new video clips substituted for the original.  Perhaps such mash-ups by substitution are more like “smash-ups,” i.e., substitution + mash-up.  Like the Grey Album, there’s still juxtaposition, but the juxtaposition is provided by what’s absent rather than by what’s present.

This substitution may significantly deepen the level of knowledge required to appreciate the smash-up.  With the Grey Album, one need only know The Beatles’ original.  Even if one isn’t familiar with rap, one can appreciate the juxtaposition of Jay-Z’s lyrics with The Beatles’ music.  And if one is familiar with both, then the level of appreciation is much deeper.

But to be truly appreciated, the Galactica: Sabotage smash-up requires a much deeper level of knowledge.  Without knowledge of the missing original images, it’s harder to appreciate how the substituted video tracks and pays homage to the original.  Of course, the same might be said of Quentin Tarantino movies, which themselves pay near-continual homage to the history of film.  But recognizing the homage is not a prerequisite to enjoying them.

Failure to consider and address valid counter-arguments may leave an essay answer on thin ice, as illustrated by Bruce Wayne in the movie Batman Begins. Below is a video showing Wayne (pre-Batman) being trained in combat by Henri Ducard, who later turns out to be the villain Ra’s al Ghul. Ducard/Ghul reminds Wayne to “always mind your surroundings.”  But Wayne, hoping for a quick and easy win, ignores the fragile ice below his feet, leading to an equally quick and humbling defeat.  At about 1:00 into the video the battle reaches its climax:

Wayne: Yield!
Ducard/Ghul: You haven’t beaten me.  You’ve sacrificed sure footing for a killing stroke.

Anticipating and raising counter-arguments isn’t just law-school stuff: it’s what lawyers do every day.  If lawyers don’t anticipate counter-arguments, they’ll be blind-sided when their adversary — or worse, the judge — raises them.  Thus, a good lawyer has to be his own “best frenemy,” anticipating the arguments against his position.  This will enable the lawyer to take a number of crucial tactics, such as: 1) strengthening arguments to avoid leaving room for counter-attack; 2) rebutting counter-arguments after they are made; 3) preemptively rebutting counter-arguments before they are made; and 4) omitting arguments that turn out to have fatal defects.

Being mindful of one’s surroundings isn’t just limited to the courtroom.  A tennis player must consider the position of her opponent before returning the ball.  A chess player must anticipate his opponent’s range of counter-moves.  And law students — as well as superheroes — must do the same.

Advice part I (life and stress) here.
Advice part II (studying and attitudes) here.
Advice part III (back up your data) here.
Advice part IV (essay exams) here.
Advice part V (conclusory argumentation) here.
Advice part VI (incomplete argumentation) here.